


It's Christmas (But Who Really Cares?)

by GracieBirdie



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alpha Peter Hale, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Although only in passing?, Christmas, Fluff and Humor, Future Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-25
Updated: 2019-12-25
Packaged: 2021-02-26 04:15:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21963442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GracieBirdie/pseuds/GracieBirdie
Summary: In which Peter isn't a damsel in distress.Stiles definitely isn't a white knight.And absolutely everyone else is sick of their shit.Also Known As: the fic in which everyone is living in a Hallmark Christmas movie expect Stiles and Peter. (Expect spoilers they totally are too.)
Relationships: Peter Hale/Stiles Stilinski
Comments: 14
Kudos: 386
Collections: Steter Secret Santa 2019





	It's Christmas (But Who Really Cares?)

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Holidays to [thecrasy](https://thecrasy.tumblr.com/) who asked for some angst with a happy ending, Alpha Peter and BAMF Stiles! Hopefully this fits the bill even if Stiles is only mildly BAMF...

Peter was having what most would consider a really shitty day.

Of course for him, it was just a Tuesday.

He didn't really like what that implied about his life.

He sighed deeply only to realize belatedly that it could come off sounding defeated instead of resigned.

The witch in front of him cackled with delight, obviously misunderstanding him.

If Peter had opposable thumbs he would have been pinching the bridge of his nose to try and stave off the headache he could feel coming on.

As it stood, not only did he not have thumbs, his front...appendages were chained to the ground. Actually all of this appendages were chained down. He tugged experimentally and felt a sharp zap of pain from the maniacals wrapped around him. Perfect. Magically chained. It would no doubt take him a while to work he way out of that...

H felt a sharp jab against his side and he turned to snarl at the other two witches. They both just laughed at him, definitely not very bothered by his display of aggression, but why should they be?

From their perspective they'd caught, chained, and muzzled a very stupid werewolf.

He couldn't really blame them for thinking that. He certainly felt stupid.

He'd been tracking down the witches for a week and thinking that there were only two of them, that it would be easy to deal with them. Two witches were nothing against Peter's years of experience dealing with supernatural (and sometimes human) threats.

He should have fucking known better.

He was getting soft in his old age.

At least there was one upside to his latest...situation.

Apparently the reason he was still alive, and the reason he'd been hunting them down to begin with, was that they liked to keep werewolves as guard dogs.

And their last one had either displeased them, or gone crazy badly enough to warrant being put down.

And now Peter was an alpha again. And he hadn't even had to break his one and only promise to Stiles to get it.

He'd known it was a trap the second he'd seen the werewolf chained down, alone in the woods, literally begging Peter to kill him.

But he'd taken the bait like a goddamn puppy.

And now he was stuck at the beck and call of three disgusting witches, a heavy metal collar biting into his neck, magic flowing out of it to shock his skin.

He stared the witch in front of him down, imaging all the different ways he could kill her, and settled in to wait for his opening.

***

Stiles did not want to be spending his winter break in Beacon Hills.

He had a job, and an apartment, fucking _friend_ he should have been hanging out with in Oregon, but instead he was cramming his white boards back into his childhood bedroom. All because Peter fucking Hale wouldn't answer his goddamn phone.

(Sure there was the whole _Christmas_ thing but Stiles and his dad hadn't celebrated Christmas in roughly fifteen years and he usually only noticed it was even December by the finals, snow, and fucking never ending Christmas songs.)

Stiles held off coming back during summer break, content with the thought that Peter was just being Peter, that he'd probably gone off the grid to hunt down some monsters to take his aggression out on. After all, the last conversation they'd had ( _three months ago_ ) had been about Scott's latest dumb decision.

Stiles had spent the call half listening and half studying for finals.

Maybe more than half studying...

He couldn't really remember most of what they talked about, although he thought there might have been something about witches?

Either way, when Stiles had realized he hadn't talked to Peter in a week or so he'd called. And it had gone straight to voice mail.

He hadn't thought much of that either.

He tried the next day but when that went to voice mail too he started to get a little concerned.

He called Cora.

While she didn't live in Beacon Hills she was the most likely person to have talked to Peter last.

Cora told him that she'd talked to Peter a few days before, that he was definitely hunting witches, and that Peter felt kind of bad he hadn't got to see Stiles on his break.

"Don't tell him I told you that last part, his pining is supposed to be a secret." she'd said, conspiratorially.

"Peter isn't pining, and he definitely isn't pining for me." Stiles said with an eye roll. He had no idea where Cora got such ridiculous ideas from.

Probably Derek. After his romance novel got popular he started to think that he was a fucking match making guru or something and no doubt filled Cora's head with romantic nonsense.

"I thought I was the one who was living by a river named De Nile."

"Fuck off."

And then he'd hung up on her because she obviously didn't have anything else useful to tell him.

He'd had sort of a nagging worry in the back of his head about Peter not answering Stiles' calls but he brushed it off.

Cora had talked to him recently, he was fine.

***

As one month turned into two months and Peter _still_ didn't answer his phone Stiles' mild anxiety turned into actual suspicion that something had happened.

He'd called Scott.

He'd called his dad.

He'd even broken down and called Chris Argent.

No one had seen Peter or spoken to him in more than a month.

Cora seemed to be the last person he talked to but she didn't feel the same concern Stiles did.

"You know how he is, Stiles." she'd said after he called her for the tenth time. "Although, yeah okay, it's weird he hasn't called you. _But_ we both know his contingency planes have contingency plans. Even if he's not fine he will be."

Stiles rubbed his hand over his face with a sigh. He knew that it was most likely Peter was alive, and even if he wasn't Stiles had helped him set up at least three of those contingency plans. He knew that in the worse case scenario he would already have Peter's sprite reenacting Paranormal Activity in his bedroom. (An actual threat Peter had once made with a completely straight face.)

"Yeah, you're probably right. But if he hasn't shown up by the time this term is done I'm going to go hunt his ass down for making me worry."

Cora was quite for a moment before she sighed too. "Yeah okay. Derek and I will come down and help if that's how it ends up."

Stiles felt his shoulders relax slightly. "Thank you."

He thought he heard Cora muttering something about Stiles being a dumbass but she hung up before he could yell at her.

***

"Look, I'm not saying it's a bad thing you're home for break but do you really have to waste your time on this?" Scott asked for what had to be the third time.

Honestly Stiles was getting a little sick of it.

"Jesus Scott come on. It's been ten years since the last time Peter was indiscriminately homicidal." He said with an eye roll (ignoring that fact that he'd never been indiscriminate, that would have just started an argument with Scott that he didn't want to get into. Again...)

He and Scott were in Stiles' old room, studying the white boards. More specifically they were looking at a map of the redwoods up north, the last place Peter's phone GPS had be active.

Considering how careful Peter was about that sort of thing he'd probably turned his phone off miles away from where he'd actually gone.

"Key word being homicidal." Scott mutter. But then he gave a deep sigh, and if Stiles looked over Scott would probably be wearing the face that looked like he'd eaten a lemon. (Stiles would know, he'd dared him to do that once.) Which meant he'd just given up arguing with Stiles. Finally.

Stiles bumped his shoulder against Scott's with a smile.

He glanced over and, yep, there was the lemon face.

"Okay fine! I'll help!" Scott said, throwing his arms up. "On one condition!"

Stiles stared at him, patiently waiting.

"When we find him you take him home with you so I don't have to deal with him anymore."

Stiles rolled his eyes. "He's not a puppy Scott. He can decide where the wants to live."

Scott stared at him for a long moment before he groaned and face palmed. "Fine." he said, voice muffled by his palm. "When we find him just ask him if he'll move to Ashland with you okay?"

"Why the hell would he-"

Stiles cut off when he heard the front door slam open and shut.

"Scott are you here? Melissa just called from the hospital!!" his dad shouted and Stiles suddenly realized he had forgotten something...

***

Four hours later Stiles was in the middle of making a 'sorry your son is such a dumbass he forgot to call ahead and tell you he was coming home for winter break/congratulation on becoming an honorary grandfather' dinner for his dad to take down to Scott, Allison, Chris, and Melissa while they all waited for the baby to be delivered.

While Stiles was mildly annoyed that he wouldn't be able to take any of them with him when he went off to look for Peter he couldn't exactly blame any of them for being busy. Especially not Allison who was _in labor_ and Scott who was over the moon at the thought that he was going to have a Christmas baby.

It was nauseating how happy everyone was.

At least Derek and Cora would be showing up soon.

He wished Erica and Kira could be too but they were visiting Kira's parents and Stiles had been firmly told no by Erica, hissing that she had _big plans_ that Stiles wasn't allowed to fuck up or she would fly all the way back to California to murder Stiles herself-

He'd apologized and promised not to call back. Which meant that in the end it would only be Stiles, Derek, Cora, and Boyd going out to look for Peter. And he was pretty sure Boyd was only going because Cora was. Well, three was better than just Stiles going by himself...

His dad was siting at the kitchen table going over all the evidence of Peter's disappearance that Stiles had so far.

He also seemed to be pointedly _not_ looking at Stiles which was just making Stiles even more anxious.

Luckily they were both distracted by a cursory knock on the front door moments before it opened.

"Hey, we're here!" Cora yelled down the hall. There were two heavy thumps that were probably her kicking her shoes off before appearing in the doorway of the kitchen.

"Thanks for picking us up from the airport." Derek called sarcastically from the hallway.

"Oh please." Stiles said, abandoning the stove to give Cora a bear hug. "Boyd told me I wasn't allowed to come pick you up and you know it."

"It's because I knew you would only have the jeep." Boyd said serenely coming in behind Cora. "And I don't trust that thing as far as I can throw it."

Considering Boyd could actually pick up and throw the jeep that was saying something. Mainly that Boyd thought the jeep was a death trap waiting to happen.

"Plus we all know you're shit at driving in the snow." Cora said with a straight face, polity pretending that 'shit at' wasn't code for 'scared of'.

"I could have pick you two up." Stiles' dad said, standing up and accepting Cora's hug with a pointed glare at Stiles over her shoulder.

Stiles winced, realizing that he'd forgotten to mention _that_ too. He was probably in for another long talk on forgetting to fill everyone in on the whole plan.

"It's fine, John." Boyd said, giving Stiles a quick hug before hip checking him away from the stove. As if he owned the place. Stiles narrowed his eyes at his back but didn't argue. He knew Boyd had done that not because everyone thought his cooking was above average but because he knew Stiles was going to start getting distracted by Cora and Derek.

It was a nice gesture in disguise.

Stiles ushered Cora down into a chair while he made her and Derek coffee, his dad asking Cora how she was liking her traveling.

Derek and Cora had both turned out to be not only very creative people when they weren't fighting for their lives but were also very interested in...herbs. And the smoking there of.

They seemed to have decided that the new meaning of their lives was to spread 'peace and love' to supernatural creatures everywhere. And one the side Derek wrote trashy romance novels and Cora wrote sarcastic coffee table books full of terrible tourist pictures.

Stiles often thought about the twists and turns his life had taken over the years that somehow lead to Peter being the _boring_ Hale. (Supernatural creature hunting aside of course, almost everyone Stiles knew did that.)

Derek came in right as Stiles was poring the coffee, sending a displeased look at the table where Cora and his dad were in the middle of a heated whispered debate over whether anyone they knew were Derek's latest book.

"You two keep that up and I'll revoke your pre-release privileges." he grumbled and he accepted the cup of coffee Stiles handed, giving Stiles a one armed hug in thanks.

His dad looked stricken and pointed accusingly at Derek. "You wouldn't dare! We're the only ones brave enough to tell you when the sex scenes are bad."

Stiles grimaced. The fact that his dad had a secret love for romance novels was one thing, hearing him discuses sex scenes that one of his friends had written was something else entirely.

Derek didn't look convinced. He sat down, huddled up comfortably in his over sized red sweater, and adjusted his nerdy glasses (that he probably didn't even really need).

"Erica would tell you." Boyd said soothingly.

"I'll have you know-" Derek started primly only to be cut off by Stiles' phone ringing.

"It's Lydia." Stiles said, starting vibrate with nerves. Lydia always come through in the end when properly bribed.

***

"Remind me to send Lydia's latest paramour a thank you present." Stiles said through gritted teeth as he clung desperately to Derek with one hand and the door handle with the other.

They'd decided (read: Stiles had been out-voted by everyone) to take Boyd's truck up where Lydia and her latest thought that Peter might be based on the last ping of his phone's GPS and a large number of "animal attracts".

Somehow they'd ended up going all the way up to the redwoods after all and after being stuck in a car for more than five hours for the second time in 36 hours Stiles was going a little insane.

"Hey this one's lasted a while." Derek said, reassuringly patting Stiles' hand. Or maybe trying to pry it off his arm.

"Yeah." Cora chimed in. "Obviously Lydia really likes her so you should try to be nice, Stiles."

"I'm always nice." he muttered, stomach churning as Boyd took a hairpin turn a little too fast.

"We're almost there." Boyd said soothingly before running it by adding "If you throw up in my truck you and Peter can both walk home."

Stiles closed his eyes and took deep breaths.

His mind wouldn't stop turning over the question of _why_ Peter would be tearing Peter apart. Stiles steadfastly refused to think that it wasn't him. If it wasn't-

He felt the truck finally start to slow before it stopped completely.

Stiles opened his eyes and looked out the window at the rinky little motel Peter's card had last been used at. (Stiles needed to have a strong talk to Peter about proper internet security if just any smart MIT undergrad could look that up.)

"His car's not here..." he said, nervously scanning the parking lot.

"Everybody hold tight where I got charm the front desk clerk." Cora said, hopping out of the passenger seat before anyone could stop her.

Derek finally managed to pull Stiles' hand off his arm so Stiles started to absently pick at his cuticles.

After only a few minutes Cora came back looking miffed but holding a duffel bag.

"Can you believe they just gave me this?" she said, climbing back inside the truck and tossing the bag over her shoulder onto Stiles' lap. "I show them one picture of me and Peter together and they're like 'yeah here take his shit it's been three months'."

"The fact that they had it at all is amazing." Boyd said with a frown, turning to watch Stiles open the bag.

"They had a policy." she muttered distracted by Stiles finding Peter's phone.

Boyd leaned forward to dig through the glove compartment until he found a charging cord for it and they all waited tensely for it to power up.

Once the phone had enough power to turn on Stiles keyed in the password and started going through Peter's notes to try and figure out what exactly he'd been hunting down last.

"Are. You. Serious!" Cora yelled and Stiles jumped in surprise.

"What?" he asked looking up to find her, Boyd, and Derek all staring at him.

Cora threw her hands up and turned away. "I'm done!"

"What?" Stiles asked again, baffled.

Boyd and Derek looked at each other for a few seconds before in unison they both just said "Nothing." and turned away from him.

Stiles decided to ignore how weird everyone was being and concentrated on the phone.

After a few minutes he finally found what he was looking for.

"Got it!" he said excitedly, copying the coordinates into google maps so they could figure out how to get to where Peter had decided the witch's base camp was.

"Finally." Cora muttered as they all piled out of the truck and pulled their hiking gear out of the back. "I was beginning to think I wouldn't get to tear anyone apart this trip."

"Don't jinx it." Stiles said with an unhappy wince.

Cora just rolled her eyes while Derek gave Stiles a sympathetic pat on the shoulder.

The four of them fell in line and started their trek off into the snow covered woods.

***

The trek took three hours and Stiles was just about ready to absolutely murder both the witches that may or may not have Peter and Peter himself. If Stiles found him that was.

As it was Stiles was remembering why he hated to go hiking with werewolves. He exhausted, soaking wet from the knees down, and so out of breath he felt like he was about to fall over.

"God, I need to get out more." He panted, leaning heavily against a nearby tree.

No one looked impressed by his complaining but he couldn't care less.

"Looks like we're about two miles away now." Boyd said, holding up his satellite GPS system.

Stiles groaned but straightened himself up with renewed determination. Soon they would either find Peter, a lead, or-

They'd get answers one way or another.

They had only been walking for a few minutes when suddenly all three wolves stopped and stiffened up, claws and fangs coming out along with some threatening growling.

Stiles felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up and he could swear he heard someone laughing in the distance.

Creepy.

And then he heard a sound that still sometimes featured in his nightmares. (Which was something he'd never tell Peter.)

***

Peter wasn't sure exactly how long he'd been with the witches. Weeks? Or months?

Was anyone even looking for him?

It had at least been long enough for someone to have found him if they were.

He had thought that at least Stiles would be wondering where he was...

But then again Stiles had a lot going on. He only had three more terms before he graduated. Or was it two now? Had it been months?

It had started snowing at some point.

Either way time was passing and Peter was board out of his mind.

Which wasn't something that one would think would be the case when playing the lap dog of a small coven.

But they didn't actually make Peter do much other than the occasional mauling or blood letting.

If they weren't keeping him against his will he might have helped them willingly. Or found someone to willing to help them...

He wished he had vocal cords that he could use to critique their methods.

Other than the chains, the living outside, and the questionable raw meat they feed him Peter could have pretended he was on vacation.

Almost.

The main problem he had (other then the ones previously listed) were his...occasional lapses...in judgment...

Some times he felt a little...off.

He didn't like it.

It was making him nervous.

He kept picturing the skeletal alpha he'd killed, kept hearing him beg Peter to kill him.

Peter kept feeling like he was...missing something.

***

"Oh that's not good." Stiles whispered, slowly backing away from the familiar shape of Peter in his alpha shift.

"When the hell did that happen?" Derek hissed around his fangs, nervously shifting his weight from foot to foot.

Everyone was tensed and ready for Peter to attack them, to try and reenact what happened last time he was an alpha and spent weeks chasing everyone around, but instead he just...stood there.

He was in a clearing, just off to the side of what looked like a large well-used tent. It had to be a camp site for someone.

The witches he had been hunting probably.

The concerning part to Stiles was how he was just...standing there, growling at them.

"Something's wrong." Stiles muttered.

"Well no shit." Cora huffed, relaxing a little at the realization that Peter probably wouldn't be attacking them at the moment.

"He's chained down." Boyd said, voice tight with anger.

Stiles took a long deep breath as he gathered his courage up. "Okay so there are still the witches somewhere, probably, can you three keep a look out while I go see if I can talk to him?"

"Jesus Christ." Boyd breathed, tilting his head back to look up at the sky. "Sure Stiles, you go have a friendly conversation with the crazy looking alpha. Who, might I had, is a known murdered."

Stiles gave Boyd a grin as he slid past him into closer to the clearing. "Thanks Boyd, you're the best."

Stiles walked up to the edge of the tree-line, hands raised up a little to try and seem non-threatening.

"Hey Peter." He said, giving him a little smile while trying not to come off like he was talking to a dog or something. "I've been looking for you."

The growling, which had gotten just a little bit louder the closer Stiles got, insistently cut off.

Peter blinked his glowing red eyes at Stiles, tipping his head up and obviously sniffing the air.

Stiles watched in fascination as Peter slowly relaxed, shoulders dropping, and sitting down on the ground to look intently at Stiles.

"Oh good." Stiles said, breathing out a sigh of relief. "You know who I am. That makes things easier."

Peter made a sort of grumbling sound that Stiles took for 'Of course I know who you are, you're just being an idiot.'

Stiles stepped closer, still a tiny bit nervous that Peter was psyching him out, but when Peter didn't even twitch Stiles crouched down to inspect the collar and shackles that were chained to the ground.

They had to either have magic in them or wolfsbane to stop Peter from braking at least the chains.

He reached out and pressed a finger against on of the shackles to see what would happen, only to yelp when his finger was shocked.

"You okay?" was instantly yelled from where the other wolves were waiting.

"Yeah fine!" he called back. "It's magic."

He pulled his bag off his back and started digging through it to find his lock pick kit. Once he found it he pulled out of one of the picks and carefully tapped it against the shackle to see if that would shock him.

It didn't.

He breathed out in relief and set about quickly and carefully unlocking everything holding Peter down.

Peter moved around as Stiles instructed him, making it easier for Stiles to get to all the locks, obviously eager to get them off of them.

Stiles hissed in sympathy when he saw that Peter's neck had gotten rubbed raw in places when the collar was taken off.

"God, I'm so sorry..." He stared, hand moving without him even thinking about it.

He gently stroked Peter's snout for a moment, only to have Peter press up against him, standing up and looming over Stiles for a moment before curling around him in a hug.

It was honestly a pretty amazing situation. Certainly no something Stiles ever thought would happen between them.

"Let's get you home." he said, rubbing his check against Peter's while Peter pressed his freezing nose against Stiles' neck.

Peter rumbled long and deep, pulling Stiles even closer against him for a moment before carefully letting him go.

Just as Stiles stepped back he heard that creepy laughter again and, yep, there were three witches.

And they looked like the goddamn movie witches too. Stiles wasn't impressed.

Especially not when Peter was already moving across the clearing to tear the three apart.

It didn't even take a minute for the three to turn into one bloody splatter in the snow.

"Wow, you didn't even need our help in the end." Boyd said flatly, looking slightly annoyed at the blood dripping off of Peter's fur, no doubt already imaging how long it would take to get blood stains out of his seats.

"Aw but you provided much needed moral support." Stiles said with a grin, leaning against Peter's side slightly as he held out a handkerchief. (One of Peter's that Stiles had ended up with at some point.) "Besides, Peter's totally going to shift back once we get to the truck, right Peter?"

Peter delicately took the handkerchief and rubbed at his jaw, staring Boyd down before he finally huffed and nodded his head.

Stiles waved his had at Peter with a flourish, while Boyd threw his hands up in surrender.

Peter snorted at Boyd in probably amusement while he carefully stuff the bloody handkerchief into Stiles' jacket pocket. Stiles wrinkled his nose but decided not to comment. Better not to leave a monogrammed (seriously why were they monogrammed?) handkerchief at a potential crime scene.

Derek and Cora carefully stepped forward to let Peter gently scent mark them and then the five of them set off for the long hike back to the truck.

***

The hike back was terrible and no one had offered (or accepted when Stiles asked) to give Stiles piggy back rides, even when he pointed out that it would be faster if they did.

His sad puppy dog eyes didn't even work on Peter! It was shocking.

Finally, after even more hours trekking through the snow, in the pitch black, Stiles was sure he would have gotten completely lost without the wolves and Boyd's GPS.

As it stood Stiles was flagging so hard that when they reached the truck he left Derek and Cora to pull out the (probably freezing) jugs of water for Peter to slosh off the blood with.

Once he was inside the truck and Boyd had started it up and turned the heater on full blast, he pulled the spare set of clothes out of his bag for Peter and himself. He held the clothes out of the cracked open window and then shoved his backpack out too for good measure.

He pulled out the blanket he'd thought far enough ahead to bring and kicked his sopping shoes, socks and pants before wiggling into his dry clothes. Boyd, who was also changing, made a disgruntled sound at him and shoved a garbage bag at him to put the them in.

Finally dry Stiles wrapped the blanket around himself and twisted to look out the window and see how Peter was doing.

He breathed a deep sigh of relief when he saw that he was human shaped again, and seemed to be snarking with Cora while Derek was on the phone. Probably calling Scott to tell them they found Peter.

Peter dressed quickly and climbed into the back set next to Stiles.

"Hey." Stiles said with a smile as he held the blanket open for Peter to slid under, kicking him when his cold wet feet touched Stiles' ankle.

"Hey yourself." Peter said, voice oddly rough as he wrapped his arm around Stiles and pulled him into a tight hug.

"Missed you." Stiles whispered against Peter's shoulder and Peter's grip got even tighter.

"Missed you too." he whispered back.

They were both quiet as they waited for Derek and Cora to change and get into the car too, ignoring Boyd as he politely ignored them back.

Eventually everyone ready for the long drive back to Beacon Hills and Stiles felt like he could finally relax.

***

"Oh my god! Just wake him up already!" Cora yelled from the front porch of the Stilinski's house.

Peter ignored her as he stared down at Stiles who was fast asleep on his shoulder just like he had been for the last three or so hours.

Peter sort of felt like he was reeling.

He was an alpha again, Stiles really had gone looking for him. He hadn't even come alone like Peter had been worried he would. He'd managed to talk people into coming with him to look for Peter. Although it _had_ been Derek and Cora so Peter liked to think he hadn't had to try very hard. And of course Boyd would have come just because Cora asked him too.

Boyd was just as much as a sucker as Peter was.

This whole thing really was just cementing his feelings for Stiles.

His heart flipped disgustingly when he thought about that second he realized that it was _Stiles_ standing in front of him, the intensity of _want_ he'd felt at his _scent_ was shocking.

He hadn't felt that way the last time he had been an alpha had he?

No, he couldn't have, he never would have let Stiles go the second he got him alone if he had.

Either way he was screwed.

"Is Cora yelling at us?" Stiles slurred, lifting his head up and rubbing at his eyes sleepily.

"Just me." Peter said reassuringly. "We're home though, if you want to get out."

"Oh!" Stiles said in surprise, waking up enough to sit up and look out the window. "Is dad home?"

"I believe so." Peter murmured watching Stiles stretched and yawn.

What the hell was Peter supposed to do now? The very thought of letting Stiles go back to school without Peter there with him made him feel psychically sick.  


"What are we waiting for? Let's go in." Stiles said, climbing awkwardly out of the truck and then yelping as he realized he didn't have any shoes on. Peter watched him attempt to sprint up the driveway to the house and pause on the pouch, hopping up and down on his toes. "You coming?" he yelled.

"I'm coming." Peter called back, ignoring the cold sludge against his own bare feet as he walked up to walk with Stiles through the front door.

"Wait!" Cora yelled and Stiles and Peter both paused in confusion.

She pointed enthusiastically up above their heads and they both looked up at... a sprig of mistletoe hanging above the door.

Peter looked at Stiles, wondering if he would give Peter one of those little kisses on the cheek friends who got caught under the mistletoe did but Stiles was staring at Peter with wide eyes.

For a long moment neither of them moved but then...

"Goddamn it might as well." Stiles said, cupping Peter's face in his hands and oh so gently, carefully kissed him.

He stared to pull back after only a moment and that just wouldn't do. Peter pulled him right back in. If Stiles wanted to kiss him Peter was going to give him one he wouldn't forget.

Vaguely he could hear his family yelling around him and for the first time Peter felt...excited for the future.

"Oh my god close the front door! I'm not paying to heat the neighborhood!"

"Werewolves are allergic to mistletoe! You've literally had mistletoe poising before! You almost died!"

"Shut up Derek! Look! It's working!"

" _Fucking finally_."

**Author's Note:**

> in case it's not clear the promise Peter made Stiles was that he wouldn't kill Scott to become an alpha (or in general)
> 
> come hang out with me on [tumblr](https://graciebirdie.tumblr.com/)


End file.
